Given the diverse amount of things on his plate, I figured this was a good time to catch up with Blanchard. It had been four years since our last conversation and a lot has changed, both with his career and our country. He spoke to me by phone from St. Louis where he was about to see the first full rehearsal with singers and orchestra (called a “sitzprobe”) of the opera.

When we last spoke you and the E-Collective had just started collaborating. You had the album Breathless coming out. The title being a reference to Eric Garner’s last words when he died in a chokehold by a New York police officer.  Subsequently you released a live album with them called Live, which found you and the band in cities where the abuse of power was at its most extreme.

What did playing in those cities give you as an artist and human that helps shape your perspective on America in 2019?

The best example I can give you how powerful that was is we were playing in Cleveland. A guy walked up afterwards and I thought it was going to be the normal conversation, “Why aren’t you playing with a jazz band instead of an electric band.” Instead he said, “I thought I was going to hear A Tale of God’s Will, but once you started playing it sounded angry.” Then he said “During the break you told us what the music was about. As I started listening to the rest of the show, my thoughts went when the guy who created God’s Will is this angry, then I have to rethink my position on gun control.” For him to share that with me was an extremely powerful moment.

[Note: A Tale of God’s Will had the subtitle Requiem for Katrina. This was music written for Spike Lee’s documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts.]

Jazz musicians seem to be addressing social injustice more prominently than other genres. Vijay Iyer’s Far From Over, for example does that. And the  music seems more muscular. Why does jazz seem to be leading the call for change as it relates to social justice?

I think it’s always bene that way. You look at Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite, the stuff [Charles] Mingus was doing, Miles [Davis] doing Jack Johnson. Even Louis Armstrong. He didn’t create some of the music, but he talked about it in some of his interviews. I think jazz musicians have a way of dealing with truth that is inherent in the music itself. In order to be a jazz musicians, you can’t lie to yourself. Either you are playing the  scales and chords or you are not. Dealing with that type of absolute truth all the time carries over into your life. It makes you look at things with that kind of prism, if you will. Two plus two will always equal four – you can’t spin that into anything else. When you look at the social justice system, it’s rough.

The festival happens one week before the premiere of Fire Shut Up in My Bones. Is the festival a great opportunity to take a break and clear your head for a few moments?

Oh man, Playboy is just a good time to be there any time of the year. There are certain music festivals like the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage –  Playboy is where you get to see many of your peers. I enjoy the shows just as much as the audience. It’s a great atmosphere to hear music and run into friends.

Singer Quiana Lynell is joining you for the Playboy Jazz Festival. You’ve mentored her after she showed up to join you for a gig in Poland at your manager’s suggestion. What does mentoring mean to you personally?

It’s huge. Huge. Because it is the mentors that actually open the doors for you and take you in and show you around. If you don’t get a chance to see how sausage is made, you’ll never be able to do it. You can approximate it, but it takes a huge role in being able to know down the myths, the folklore and just deal with the absolute truth. That’s what Art Blakey did for me. And by being in that band, automatically you were accepted in a family of musicians that would embrace you. Dizzy Gillespie, Clark Terry, Woody Shaw; all of them were extremely helpful to me.

What are some of those myths and folklore?

I guess mainly the thing is intuitive talent versus the hard work kind of things. When I got into the business I heard stories about how hard Dizzy and Clifford Brown worked. I even talked to Chick Corea about it. He said, “It ain’t no magic. It just takes a lot of time and practice.” That was one of the first lessons I really got to understand.

Next week will have part two of our interview with Terence Blanchard where he gets into details about Fire Shut Up in My Bones and its creation.

The post Terence Blanchard: From Jazz to Opera in One Week appeared first on Cultural Attaché.

If this all sounds a bit like A Star Is Born (minus the love story), it is, perhaps, because it is. But it’s a story best told by Lynell herself as not only is she performing as a special guest with Blanchard, he was the producer of her debut album, A Little Love. She spoke with me recently by phone from her home in Louisiana.

How did you get put in touch with Terence Blanchard?

There was  a volunteer that was working with WWOZ radio station that heard me that also worked with Terence’s manager. She was, “Who is this? How did I not know her?” Then I got an e-mail on my website from Terence’s manger. We met, had a little dinner and she expressed her interest in managing me. At that dinner she told me Terence had a show in Poland. She said, “I think you’d be perfect for it. It’s in June.” I had never met Terence. I had never met her. I had been meandering my way for 7-8 years at this point and I’ve been told a few things a few times. A couple weeks go by and then she sent me an e-mail asking for my passport information. I met Terence at the gig in Poland. 

How did that go?

I was so nervous and I was overly prepared. You don’t want to go on Terence’s bandstand messing stuff up. This was my first time on an international gig and it is Terence Blanchard and an 80-piece orchestra. I meet Terence at rehearsal. He says, “You’re here now, you might as well have some fun. Stop being nervous and start doing your thing.” He was welcoming and assuring.

You also won the Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition. With it came a deal with Concord that lead to your album, A Little Love. When did Terence become your mentor for that project?

From that first day he’s been like a mentor, that’s just who he is. It comes from all the people who have mentored him. The history of jazz is to help perpetuate the art and the fidelity of the art. He jumped on board as my mentor. We went into the studio to work on a demo even before the competition. He was part of that before the album came up.

We’ll take a quick break to hear what Terence Blanchard* has to say about her. 

TB:  She has that level of connection with the music that only certain gifted people have. I think that thing that is most admirable about her is she is willing to work and learn. We just did a show in Detroit and when we finished rehearsing we went upstairs. We could hear Quiana rehearsing her music. We were all sitting outside her door. When she came out she said, “You were out here?” I told her that’s what it takes – rehearsing day by day. That all adds up over the course of your career.

Now back to Quiana…

There’s that old adage that “everything happens for a reason.” Why do you think this was the right time in your life as a singer, as a mother, to have this career momentum?

I’m mature enough. I just did my first tour and I was in Australia. It’s beautiful and I’m face-timing my kids. I can still be in contact with them and talk with them. It’s just the right time in my life is how I feel. I couldn’t have planned it any better if I tried. My mom has been with me the last five years and that has helped tremendously in getting my music career off the ground.

On your Facebook page you posted a promo video for your album and you said, “So it’s official, I’m an artist or whatever…” Has the reality of where you are today sunk in?

It definitely has. The reality is here. This is the life and it is sinking in more and more every week. I’ve really started working so I came home last week from a tour. I was gone 16 days – the longest I’ve been gone. I was home for four  days and gone again. My children look at me and this is life right now. Every weekend I’ve been out and they’re rolling with it. [Her children are 16 and 11.] They are my number one supporters. They just want to mark on their calendars which trips they are taking with me.

You’ve included an Irma Thomas song on your album. She said in a 2008 interview with The Telegraph that “The secret’s always in the story of the song.” What is the challenge for you in finding your take on the secret in the song?

I’m going to go back to why now. I think the most effective storytellers and song stylists have been through a lot. I’ve been through so much before I decided to really pursue my dreams that I can relate to almost…I’ve been there. I’ve been at the lowest of the low and some of the highest of the highs and I can pull on a lot of reference when I approach a story. 

You’re going to be playing the Hollywood Bowl at the Playboy Jazz Festival. That’s a little venue with about 18,000 seats. What are you looking forward to most about that gig?

18,000? I’m sorry. I was thinking…good grief. Wow! Well, I’m looking forward to the moving, the stage moves right? I’m looking forward to that because I haven’t experienced that before. I watch Nancy Wilson at Newport all the time and it’s a phenomenal set. In my heart of hearts I just want to be that type of artist that can captivate an audience of thousands of people from a stool. I’m just embracing every opportunity to share a little light and love – 18,000? I was thinking 6,000 or 10,000. Really, 18,000? I’m excited about walking across that stage. I just want it to be great.

*Check back for our interview with Terence Blanchard this week.

For tickets go here.

Photos of Quiana Lynell by Eye Wander.

The post Quiana Lynell: From Local Singer to the Playboy Jazz Festival appeared first on Cultural Attaché.

Henry IV – The Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles at the Japanese Garden at VA West LA

Now – July 1st

Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson have long been supporters of the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles. This year Hanks is upping his support by taking on the role of Falstaff in a new version Shakespeare’s Henry IV Parts 1 and 2. Daniel Sullivan directs the production that stars, along with Hanks, Hamish Linklater, Joe Morton, Harry Groener and Rondi Reed. This is an outdoor venue, so if you plan on going, dress warmly. And settle in for a comic tale of fathers and sons that also has its share of drama and pathos.

Brahms Requiem – LA Master Chorale at Walt Disney Concert Hall

June 9-10

There are three requiems that are beloved: Mozart’s, Verdi’s and the Brahms Requiem. The Los Angeles Master Chorale, under the direction of Grant Gershon, will be performing Brahms’ masterpiece in two performances this weekend. Also on the bill are compositions by two Pulitzer Prize-winning composers:  Fly Away I by Caroline Shaw and where you go by David Lang. The Lang composition is having its West Coast Premiere.

Soft Power – Ahmanson Theatre

Final Weekend

This is your last chance to see one of the most adventurous new musicals to come along in quite some time. Soft Power, which is actually described as a play with a musical, was written by David Henry Hwang (M. Butterfly and Yellow Face) with music and additional lyrics by Jeanine Tesori (Fun Home, Caroline Or Change). It begins as a play depicting the night when a Chinese diplomat meets Hillary Clinton. They fall for each other. After a brutal event in the narrative impacting a third character, the play becomes a musical. 50 years later that musical is being celebrated and revived. It is a very unique structure, but the creators were not afraid to be adventurous in finding a new way of telling their story. The show concludes its run in Los Angeles this weekend and will continue in San Francisco starting June 20th. What happens after San Francisco has yet to be determined. If you like theatre that challenges at the same time it entertains, don’t miss Soft Power.

Main photo by Craig Schwartz

The Tony Awards – CBS or Viewing Parties

June 10

For theatre fans the biggest night of the year is unquestionably the Tony Awards. The annual awards celebration takes place on Sunday. The broadcast is at 8 PM and by the time it runs tape-delayed on the West Coast we will already know who the winners will be. Will Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts 1 and 2 win Best New Play? Will The Band’s Visit win Best New Musical? Will Angels in America win Best Revival of a Play? Will My Fair Lady win Best Revival of a Musical? Okay, maybe those are my predictions. We’ll have to watch on Sunday to find out. And if you are looking for opportunities to watch the Tony Awards in a more public setting than your living room, The Actors Fund has their annual Los Angeles Viewing Party on Sunday at the Skirball Center. Tickets may still be available. The honoree this year is Winnie Holzman (book writer for the musical Wicked.) There is also a viewing party at the Segerstrom Center  in Costa Mesa.

Don’t forget:

The Playboy Jazz Festival runs Saturday and Sunday (Legendary jazz saxophonist Charles Lloyd and the Marvels with Lucinda Williams are the highlight on Sunday.)

Long Day’s Journey Into Night has two previews Friday & Saturday before officially opening on Sunday at The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. The production stars Jeremy Irons and Lesley Manville.

The post The Six Shows You Must See: This Weekend in LA (6/8-6/10) appeared first on Cultural Attaché.

A quick glance at his career reveals an artist who has played with a who’s who of jazz and blues greats:  Howlin’ Wolf, B.B. King, Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy, Don Cherry Charlie Haden, Gerald Wilson, Cannonball Adderley and more. When he started his first quartet he introduced the world to Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette. He played and toured extensively with The Beach Boys. More recently he worked with Brad Mehldau, John Abercrombie and Jason Moran.

To have a conversation with Lloyd is like the best kind of improvisation. You go wherever his thoughts take you and you have to be on your toes: the references come fast and furious. His views of the world today are equal parts fire and compassion. And his views on music come from a deeply peaceful and humble place. In other words, it’s like jazz itself. I spoke with him by phone from his home in Montecito.

You told the PBS NewsHour that “the creator will let me get just so close” to “the beautiful sound in my mind’s ear.” If you actually ever got to it, instead of just close, would there be anything left to accomplish?

It’s true. I’m a late bloomer and I keep trying to get closer to it. There is a sound that I hear in my mind’s ear, but I’ve not yet gotten there. Fortunately the creator has kept me around for a while so I can keep working on it. It’s something that kind of stays with you. I always played music because I loved it and starting as a young child, it’s always been my refuge, my all. I’m blessed to have that connection with that music and it informs me of higher thinking. If I could find that sound of all sounds, the mysticism of sound, which I’ve been striving for all my life, I’d put on the loin cloth and go back into the forest.

When one looks at your discography and the people with whom you have collaborated, it seems that putting you in a box would be a foolish exercise.

Thank you kindly. I’m just doing what I’m doing and there are these coming togethers. Many of my heroes left town at early ages. I’m still around. I have a beginner’s mind to be candid with you. I’m always striving for that freshness and that situation where, as my friend Herbie Hancock says, uncertainty becomes your ally. I’m walking this path and I’m a sound seeker and I hear things and I hear things that never were. It’s a small world, yet it’s a large world, but if you have dreams and visions and connection with the creator, something can happen that’s a blessing in the music. I keep looking for, how to say, that freshness, that kind of sweet and sour sauce I crave. I need my salsa, too. I like it picante. I love the tender ballads and I like to go on the high wire and stretch out. Before I play I tend to be a little nervous and the next thing I know they are trying to take me off the stage. The newness, that’s a great word, to be in the now is a beautiful thing.

In the press information for Vanished Gardens you are quoted saying about Lucinda Williams that she “is a reporter of the human condition, of life on planet Earth.” How does her reportage blend with your view of the human condition today?

You haven’t heard the song yet. She wrote a new song “We’ve Come Too Far To Turn Around.” It’s all in there. She talks directly and her poet nature and mysticism that comes through. How she can imbibe the human condition and report it back. She loves that we’re so loose and free with what we do and it encourages her to feel a way she’s never felt before.

Billy Higgins, your close friend and collaborator, was concerned about the future. He said “Because the stuff they feed kids now, they’ll have a bunch of idiots in the next millennium as far as art and culture is concerned.” Was he right?

Of course. He was a wise man. He was always asking the creator for it. When I look at his visitation through here, he was always bringing it and had that natural beauty. That was a great blessing in my life to be around poeple like him. I was around when giants roamed the earth. That’s a great blessing for me. When young musicians play with me, they weren’t there. You bring it and you have it. Being around hearing Coltrane hold church or Sonny Rollins take over a room or Monk with that beautiful expressive thing. I played with those guys and so many guys. Buddy Collette was a mentor to Eric Dolphy. Buddy told Mingus when he was a little boy with a cello, “if you get a bass, I’ll put you in the band.” Buddy is the spiritual father to Dolphy, myself and many others. He was the underground railroad looking after us and sending us to New York.

There’s so much turmoil going on in the world, perhaps even more so than when you went to the Soviet Union, at the request of the people, not the government, during the Cold War. What role does music play in providing both commentary and balance in a world that seems to be spinning out of control?

I think it is just healing. I don’t imagine a world without music. The human condition is something that needs some nurture and food for the soul. When I went to Russia the Cold War thing was going on, but now it’s just gotten…It’s despicable now how the behavior of the scene is and how people profit off divisiveness. It’s so blatant. The game is more subtle, but it’s also more gross. The grossness of it needs some tenderness and the music touches the heart. Hopefully we’ll have more young people waking up to the condition of the condition. I was around in the 60s when Jimi Hendrix, the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin were around. Bob Dylan was a friend. We were idealists. We didn’t live in a world of bifurcation or lines of demarcation. That has to do with thievery and stepping on other people. I don’t know how we got to this situation. It baffles me. I’m very upset about it.

Beethoven said “don’t only practice your art, but force your way into its secrets, for it and knowledge can raise men to the Divine.” Do you feel that your career has raised you to the Divine?

Anyone who knows don’t say and anyone who says don’t know. I’m not going to pat myself on the back. I’m still a beginner’s mind and the further I go I realize I’m knowing less and less. But the experience of living and loving truth and love, something happens for me that puts me in a way that I have to be from time to time.  Going back to what you asked me earlier, if I ever get to that place where I can play that one sound, I think it will heal the universe. It’s like my original groups where I thought I could change the world with my creativity. I’m naïve enough to think that.

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Sunday’s headliner is The Ramsey Lewis Quintet. Also on the bill are Jazmine Sullivan, Charles Lloyd and the Marvels with special guest Lucinda Williams, Tower of Power celebrating their 50th Anniversary and more.

The program begins each day at 3 PM. As he has for several years, George Lopez returns as Master of Ceremonies.

Look for our interview with jazz legend Charles Lloyd later this week.

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Jazz may not enjoy the same widespread popularity as it did in its heyday, but Lopez says the idea that the genre is on the outs couldn’t be further from the truth. “It is more prevalent than people know,” he says. “Even those Seinfeld bumpers were jazz. It’s used as almost the broth of anything you are going with. When I graduated from high school, Chuck Mangione’s Feels So Good was part of summer. And seeing Howling Wolf, Buddy Guy, Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones—it’s all connected. So many things are derived from jazz.”

If given the chance to program the festival himself with anyone alive or dead, Lopez comes up with an eclectic and classic line-up of musicians. “I would get Miles Davis to play,” he says “And I’d get Don Cheadle to play with him. I would get John Coltrane. I would get Dizzy Gillespie. I would get Sammy Davis Jr. to introduce him. I would get Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, and I’d get Santana to play. Man, I’d get Steely Dan out there. I’d get a little bit of some funk, some George Clinton, those guys. I’d bring Prince out there. He’d love that. He was funky. I’d ask Playboy if I could go into Monday, too. I’d lengthen the sets to 90 minutes.”

And he’d love to see himself up there, but not performing a full set. “I’ve gotten to learn how to play guitar since I was 15,” he says. “I’m traveling with one now. I’m friends with Eddie van Halen, and he just gave me a lesson a couple days ago. I think every comedian wants to be a musician and every musician wants to be a comedian.”

Photography Courtesy: Playboy Jazz Festival/Matthew Imaging

The post George Lopez Really Wants to Perform at the Playboy Jazz Festival, but for Now He’ll Just Emcee appeared first on Cultural Attaché.

“It’s definitely an achievement,” Blacc says. “It’s something I’ve aspired to as a musician and an artist in Los Angeles. The Hollywood Bowl is one of those achievements in your career where you feel like you’ve reached a certain point where you are worthy to take the stage at the venue. It’s great to be a part of it.”

If you’ve heard the song “Wake Me Up” (and who hasn’t at this point?), you’ve heard both his songwriting and his singing. You might also know “I Need a Dollar.” In 1995, Blacc formed the group Emanon (taking the name from a Dizzy Gillespie song of the same name that when spelled backwards is “No Name.”) Life Your Spirit is his third album as a solo artist and yielded the song “The Man.” Blacc, who grew up in Laguna Hills and went to USC, studied the trumpet as a kid.

“I never thought I would be involved in jazz as a career,” he reveals. “I never thought I’d be involved in music as a career. I enjoyed the jazz classes and enjoyed listening to the music. I let the trumpet go for a fonder affinity for hip-hop music, but I still enjoy the occasional jazz realm of sampling and studying basically all the older music.”

It’s easy to see an overlap between jazz and hip-hop. A quick search would reveal that another of this year’s Playboy Jazz Festival participants, Herbie Hancock, has had his music sampled by hip-hop artists over 600 times. That doesn’t surprise Blacc.

“Especially from the early part of sampling and when vinyl was part of the fabric of hip-hop music,” he says. “ I think a lot of my education about jazz came from my affinity for hip-hop and the search for great jazz samples. Herbie Hancock’s involvement in hip-hop is quite notable as well. There are some compositions of his in the ‘80s, in the early part of the hip-hop era, that were bordering on the genre.”

When asked if he will be making significant alterations to his set list for the festival, Blacc says, “Not really. I’ve been thinking about doing that recently, but I haven’t gotten around to it. I just play the songs I feel good about playing on stage. I don’t go to the slow and ballad-y songs in my catalogue. I keep it energetic with audience call and response. That’s the way I’ve been trained through hip-hop and it’s translated to my singing career.”

Blacc, who is also playing at the Montreux Jazz Festival this summer, credits taking risks with motivating his career and leading him to the Playboy Jazz Festival. “What got me here is being open to all kinds of change and taking the risk of stepping out of my comfort zone and performing as a vocalist when I hadn’t had any formal training or expectations of being a vocalist. All of these moments of taking the risk of failure have ultimately led me to something positive. It’s kind of a hallmark of later jazz mentality–there is no wrong way to do it.”

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On Thursday night, Blanchard will celebrate the collaborations of jazz legend Miles Davis and arranger Gil Evans at Walt Disney Concert Hall in a show called Still Ahead. Their albums: Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess and Sketches of Spain are considered masterpieces.

“It’s one of those things where you had a perfect meeting of minds,” says Blanchard of the duo’s work. “Gil’s arrangements were perfectly suited for Miles’ expression. You can’t manufacture that. You have to appreciate it and be thankful those guys found each other. When you look at Miles from Birth of the Cool, you can tell he was trying to simplify. Couple that with Gil Evans’ harmonic arranging you can tell he was opening up that harmonic sense and that really suited what Miles was doing at the same time.”

The richness of the material makes choosing a set list a real challenge. “Therein lies the problem,” Blanchard says before laughing. “Wayne Shorter talked about life as one continual composition. I firmly believe that. When it comes time to choose material for a concert, I have to go with my gut realizing that’s where I am at the moment. Tomorrow if we were to do the same concert, it wouldn’t be the same show.”

Blanchard also has a new recording coming out called Breathless. Along with his new groove-based group, E Collective, they will perform at this year’s Playboy Jazz Festival. The CD’s title came from his daughter. “I was talking to her about the whole idea behind that tune. I was writing for Eric Garner and things going on with young black men and experiences with police. When I was talking to her it was in the middle of the ‘I Can’t Breathe’ campaign. My son went through it. He was arrested on suspicion of burglary. I was on my way to Europe. What saved him is one of the cops knew me. That’s a situation that could have gone seriously wrong rather quickly.”

Much like his idol Miles Davis, Blanchard believes passionately in civil rights. Which raises the question, has the world gotten better for jazz and for people?

“The world is getting to be a better place for jazz. You have young kids coming to this music who are serious about playing. In terms of being a better place in general, I’m kind of up in the air about that. What has to happen is you have to get rid of the poison to get rid of the infection in your system. Because we have a black president it uncovered a lot of the ugliness we’ve had for the last few decades. The way demographics are changing, there’s going to be a huge shift and that will be felt around the world. I think we’re on the upswing. I think we’re in the dirty part of the recovery.”

Photo Credit: NITIN VADUKUL

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